Distribution Probabilistic Load Flow Solution Considering Network Reconfiguration and Voltage Control Devices

Electric power industry deregulation has forced utilities to perform studies to determine the changes that should be made for efficiency improvements, cost reductions, and power quality enhancements. At the distribution system level, there are a number of attributes can influence the system operation performance. To fully evaluate the distribution network operation performance, a distribution probabilistic load flow solution method based on Monte Carlo simulation is proposed in this paper. It is assumed that the uncertainties of daily time varying load, voltage control devices at the line segments, and feeder reconfigurations for service restorations and load balancing can be estimated or measured. The proposed method can be used to calculate distributions of the power flows at various sections of the feeder and voltage profiles at all nodes of the network for operation planning. This method allows probabilistic modeling of the distribution system operations and provides a base model for assessing the effects of distributed generation and voltage mitigation equipments on the operating performance of the distribution network. Flexibility of the proposed method is tested on a modified IEEE 13 node feeder test system.